Cricket Australia on Tuesday postponed a scheduled tour to Pakistan due to security fears and said it was unlikely to proceed before 2009.

CA chief executive James Sutherland said his organisation had no alternative but to postpone the tour, which was due to begin later this month, given the security situation in Pakistan.

"Our absolute priority has been the security and safety of our players and our employees," he told reporters in an announcement that came as two explosions rocked the city of Lahore, killing at least 20 people

"We've left no stone unturned, we wanted to play this tour."

He said CA acted on advice from the Australian government and its own advisers.

While CA said in a statement that it hoped the tour could be rescheduled "in the near future", Sutherland made it clear that it would not happen before next year at the earliest.

"There's a couple of windows in 2009 and 2010 and there might be a little bit of massaging in order to make that happen," he said.

Officials from both countries are scheduled to meet in Dubai next weekend to discuss possible dates for the deferred tour.

Sutherland denied that pressure from Australian players was behind the decision.

"I understand that some players may have had feelings about the tour, but from CA's perspective we had absolute obligations were were committed to under the Future Tours programme," he said.

"If the safety and security warnings had been sufficient for us to tour then we'd have toured."

The Australian government, which has a travel advisory warnings against travel to Pakistan, said it was pleased with the decision.